


the smell of old books and coffee

by Scarlet66



Category: Tokyo Ghoul
Genre: F/M, Gen, Shameless Wish Fulfillment, Suicide mention, That's it, all i want out of life is for kaneki ken to be happy, and touken to be canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-24
Updated: 2016-03-24
Packaged: 2018-05-27 19:24:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,212
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6296977
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Scarlet66/pseuds/Scarlet66
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>One day, he'll be Okay.</em><br/> <br/>In which Kaneki Ken survives everything the world throws at him, and finally finds some solace.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the smell of old books and coffee

**Author's Note:**

> let's play guess the character lmao

 

One day, he'll be Okay. 

The scars will be there, but the angry red will fade from them like the colour will disappear from sun-washed paper. They'll hurt every once in a while for a long, long time. He'll scream and cry in the middle of the night because of them.

He'll sit in the bathtub and count every one, every single imperfection in his skin that speaks of some distant pain from the past. He'll become mesmerized in it. He'll imagine bruises blooming across a chest and back smaller than his, where they're hidden from curious eyes. He'll imagine clawing at his eye sockets and crying blood. He'll imagine himself trembling on checkered tiles, screaming his throat hoarse until all he can squeeze out is a pathetic croak for help that no one will ever hear, wondering why no one will come. 

But then he'll wake up, sitting in water that has become a bit too cold, and realize the same thing again: the checkered room was a cage of his own making. No one came because he wouldn't allow anyone in. 

He'll get up, then, and go to the coffee shop. She'll make it just like she knows he likes it: deep, just a little bitter, with a foamed rabbit on top. He'll pull a book off the shelf and for a few hours he'll be surrounded by the soft, comforting presence of life. He'll feel content. 

Nothing will ever calm him down like the smell of old books and coffee. They'll remind him of a life he used to have and the life he will have. Sometimes he'll need reminders.

Sometimes there will be a voice in his head. A beautiful voice, sick and sweet and eloquent with her words. A voice dripping honey calling him back to a life smelling of iron, telling him they're alike. He'll blink and he'll see a flash of jade hair and red grinning lips and the nails of one hand will dig into his palm, drawing blood. 

It's a voice as sad and lonely as his.

He'll wake up on the morning of his birthday and feel useless and broken. Like nothing will ever be fixed, like  _he_ will never be fixed. How could he be? He was never whole in the first place.

He'll remember every single mistake he's ever made with cruel, crystal clarity. He'll recall the faces of those he's abandoned, of those he couldn't save, of those he's killed. He'll have doubts and regrets that he'll probably never be able to cast away and they'll writhe and squirm in the back of his mind like worms.

He'll look into the abyss and the abyss will beckon. Come here, it will say.

But in the end he'll still get up, because his best friend did everything in his power to keep him alive.

Because when he finally allowed himself to take a peek outside his homemade birdcage, he saw the faces of the people he loved waiting patiently and staring pleadingly back. Because a tiny girl with blue pigtails proudly declared him the mother-figure of their tiny makeshift family. Because a woman of steel once embraced him and told him names were unimportant. Because the last expression he ever saw on the white reaper's face was one of peace and quiet, unwavering pride. Because a tall man cloaked in black with a glowing right eye insisted — unlike the first time they met — that he wasn't a monster who deserved to rot. 

Because even though the hands that bruised his small body and the hands that taught him how to read belonged to the same woman, love does not always have to be accompanied by pain.

One day, he'll come to accept these truths for what they are: truths. He'll know them in his heart, and he'll believe in them. 

He _isn't_ poison. 

He _is_ loved.

It will get fractionally easier each day to repeat this to himself, even just to whisper it in the hours preceding dawn. Baby steps, he'll mutter. One foot in front of the other. Eventually, it will be less like trying to navigate an uphill forest of thorns.

He'll allow himself to wish for his own happiness, at first because that's what others will want, and then because he'll want it for himself. He'll let himself be close to the people who love him. He'll let himself accept his best friend's forgiveness — not that there was anything to forgive, the latter will insist. 

He'll allow himself to slowly fall for a woman to whom he once gave a rabbit keychain to show he still cared, because she is strength and warmth and fierce loyalty. Because she waited for him for seven months and then three years, and she still has more faith in him than he himself does. She'll become his tether to the ground, his home. He'll pluck up the courage to tell her he won't leave again, and she'll believe him. 

He'll learn that feather-light touches made out of love can heal the burns left by scalding cold fingers. He'll realize that he, too, is a source of warmth to others and when he does, he'll rediscover a wish he thought long-forgotten: a simple desire to do what he can to help those who need it.

He'll learn to have some faith in himself, too.

And then, slowly, he'll try to make amends. He'll apologize to the ones who relied on him for leaving when they needed him most; those who believed in him whose trust he betrayed; the people he used and hurt to further his own selfish, self-destructive goals. They might be reluctant, but he'll be persistent. 

The last person whose forgiveness he needs will be his own. Eventually, he'll give it.

He'll be the bridge — or rather, one of its pillars. That will be another reminder he'll need occasionally — you can't build anything with just one support. 

And if the title of the one-eyed, half-blind king will help him with that, well... he won't complain.

He'll tear himself up over it and he'll struggle and struggle to keep everyone he loves from perpetuating the cycle of bloodshed he had been caught up in. He'll come close to falling back into it himself as the old carnal instinct resurfaces from time to time. But he won't. Among the many things he'll have learned, one fact will stand out: blood will not wash away hatred. 

He won't be able to save everyone, because not everyone is his to save. Not everyone will want or need to be saved. He'll set limits for himself and he'll keep to them, because protecting himself is as important as protecting his loved ones. Whatever the consequences, none of it will be entirely his fault. Those are also truths he will come to accept. 

It will take years, and years, and years. The scars will never go away. The nightmares won't vanish. The regrets will remain. He'll still hear the people who tormented him cackling as they throw him inside that checkered cage. 

It'll hurt like hellfire. But only every once in a while.

He won't be alone. The cage won't stay closed forever. He'll be older, and a bit wiser.

And one day, he'll be Okay.

 

**Author's Note:**

> it is sad and almost pathetic how invested i am in this one boy's happiness


End file.
